Blizzard World, the newest map to be added to Overwatch, will be made available in the game on January 23, 2018, according to the game's official Twitter.
Created with the theme of a fictional amusement park, Blizzard World features a number of rides & attractions based on Blizzard Entertainment's various IPs from its history as a company. Even The Lost Vikings gets a bit of a shout-out in the map, although Rock n' Roll Racing seems to have been left out in the cold for this one. Designed as a Hybrid map, attacking players must unlock a capture point and then guide a payload down a path to subsequent checkpoints in order to win the game. Have a look at its Coming Soon trailer to see some of the map's scenery:
The map has been on the Public Test Realm for a couple of months now. Players had been repeatedly asking about its release and it was addressed by Game Director Jeff Kaplan a week ago on the game's official forums. Blizzard World had a number of small issues to be sorted out such as problems with buildables in certain areas and map geometry that could result in players getting stuck in certain locations (especially when playing with highly mobile characters like Lúcio or Genji). The map also needed some more optimization work as it has "the most stuff in it by far" compared to previous maps released for the game.
The map and the new loot box items are planned to come out together according to a post from a week ago on the Battle.net forums by Mr. Kaplan. The upcoming Junkrat & Mercy nerfs that are being tested on the PTR aren't likely to release at the same time as the map, owing to time for additional testing. The Mercy changes, in particular, will change how the character fundamentally plays, so it's understandable that Blizzard wants to make sure they get it right before bringing it live to the game.
As for how Blizzard World will feature in the Overwatch League, it's not yet known if the map will make it into the game's rotation. The schedule for the league shows that the first two Stages of the league (each lasting five weeks) have their maps set and Blizzard World does not appear to be among any of them. The map details for Stage 3 and onwards doesn't yet show up, so the earliest we might see the OWL pros take a crack at the latest map for the game would probably be the beginning of April 2018. As for the rest of us, Blizzard World will release to the live Overwatch servers on January 23, 2018.
